


Not Ready Now

by lovelyjo



Category: Dimension 20 (Web Series)
Genre: Gen, M/M, Missing Scene, Teens being teens
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2019-11-10
Updated: 2019-11-10
Packaged: 2021-01-26 17:41:29
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,156
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/21377983
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/lovelyjo/pseuds/lovelyjo
Summary: The Bad Kids get bored during their two-day voyage to Leviathan and talk about teen stuff. Riz is really not in the mood.Or, the Bad Kids are the Bad Kids and Riz is trying to repress his feelings.
Relationships: Adaine Abernant & Riz Gukgak, Riz Gukgak/Fabian Aramais Seacaster
Comments: 20
Kudos: 295





	Not Ready Now

**Author's Note:**

> This is a "dealing with feelings he doesn't want to have because growing up lonely kinda fucks you up" Riz fic. I wanted to do a scene during their two days at sea because I always love to see what happens when characters are trapped together for long periods of time. I also wanted to have a fic that included Riz's (and Adaine's, though to a lesser extent in this fic) tendency to avoid actually talking about their feelings. I'm a big fan of Riz being gay and loving Fabian and not knowing how to process from there and I'm a big fan of Riz and Adaine being best friends. I hope you enjoy it!

They were all going a little stir crazy cooped up in the van for, what, 35 hours at this point? And Fabian said he thought they were still hours away from Leviathan, but Riz wasn’t 100 percent confident in Fabian’s choppy knowledge of this place. 

Sandralynn, Cathilda, and Gilear were taking some time to themselves on the roof and Tracker had adjusted her moon haven so that all eight of them could fit into one interdimensional pocket. And Riz got it, he was getting antsy, too. But this is not his first choice of ways to let off a little steam. He glanced over at Adaine who was very purposefully playing with Boggy. 

“Come on it’s not weird, guys. The person I most want to kiss in the room is Tracker,” Kristen said. Riz rolled his eyes. There were several audible groans. Tracker smiled leaned over to kiss her and Kristen obliged happily. 

“Yeah, dudes, it’s not weird. The person I most want to kiss in the room is Fabian,” Ragh said. He pointed to Fabian and winked at him. 

Fabian’s eyebrows shot up. “I’m flattered, Ragh.” He cleared his throat. “But  _ of course _ that’s true, I am the most attractive person here.” 

“You know, Ragh, you shouldn’t feed Fabian’s ego,” Tracker said. 

Ragh just shrugged and said, “I don’t know what to tell you, man, he’s hot.” 

“Well, the person I most want to kiss is Aelwyn,” Fabian said.

“She’s not in the room, dumbass,” Kristen said. 

“Why do we have to play this game with people in the room? I want to kiss Aelwyn more than anyone here!” 

Riz felt a ping in his stomach that he immediately shoved that feeling into the “weird feelings he didn’t want to fully process” compartment of his brain, which was something he had to keep shoving feelings in lately. 

“Because we’re, like, team building or whatever.” 

“We’re  _ team building  _ right now?” Riz heard his voice shoot up an octave. This was fucking insane and it was too much for Riz right now. 

“Yeah, we’re sharing things about ourselves.” Kristen looked over at Fabian. “Fine. We can just talk about who we most want to kiss in general, then.” 

“Wonderful! Again, I am dreaming of kissing Aelwyn right now.” Riz heard Adaine cough loudly. 

“Okay, Adaine, who do you most want to kiss, then?” Fabian asked pointedly. 

Riz hoped one of these days Fabian would catch on and understand that Adaine was way more uncomfortable with Fabian pursuing her sister than she was letting on. In one of their late-night study-spiral sessions, Adaine had quietly told him more about her life at home. Riz had never been more grateful for his mom. 

Adaine looked Fabian straight in the eyes, giving him a look that reminded Riz of when she took down Biz. Then she took a quick breath. 

“I most want to kiss Boggy,” she said. Then she smiled down at the frog and gave him a kiss on his very round head. Boggy looked extremely happy to be there. 

Fabian scoffed. “That’s not a very good answer.” 

She got that look in her eye again and cocked her head. “I think if it’s the truth then it’s a good answer.” 

“I suppose,” Fabian said and backed off, seeming to finally pick up Adaine’s mood. 

“Well, if anyone wants to know  _ my  _ answer it was going to be Dr. Asha, but I’m trying to, like, give up fake relationships with middle-aged men,” Fig said. She got an intensely serious look on her face and took a deep breath. “So I most want to kiss myself.” 

“ _ What _ ? Yourself?” Kristen said. “That’s the most cop-out answer of the night!” 

“I’m trying to have a healthy relationship, and that starts with yourself, right? I’m developing self-love!” 

There were several snickers at “self-love” but Adaine looked at her and said, “I think that’s great, Fig.” 

“ _ Thank _ you, Adaine.” Fig sat back and lit up a cigarette. 

“But you have to stop doing that in the van,” Adaine said. Fig huffed and did not put her cigarette out. 

Gorgug let out a heavy sigh. “Does anyone want to help me build a cell phone tower so that I can call Zelda? I want to kiss her the most and I’m just feeling really bad that I’m letting her down.” 

“I’m sorry, Gorgug, I don’t know if we can do that,” Fig said, patting him on the arm. “I promise I’ll help you make it up to her when we get back, though.” 

Gorgug smiled weakly. 

“Yeah, Gorgug, things were crazy and you made a mistake. It’s cool. And if she breaks up with you, that’s her loss,” Kristen said. 

Gorgug groaned and leaned back, partially disappearing into a fold in the blankets. 

“Well, The Ball, it’s just down to you. Who do you most want to kiss?” 

All of the feelings Riz had compartmentalized away into the “weird feelings” corner of his brain came rushing back out. The slight hum of anxiety about when it would be his turn was approaching full blown panic. He felt his face heat up and his stomach drop at the same time. Everything was too quiet.

He felt embarrassed about talking about kissing and mad at himself for feeling that way and overwhelmed by the pressure. He shuffled through the options looking for the answer he hated saying the least. Adaine had already said Boggy, which was a great non-answer. He couldn't say a real person they all knew because it would just open a barrage of questions and comments he really didn’t want to get into. Baron was supposed to be just something he could say to get people off his back, but that was totally a bust and honestly traumatic. Oh, fuck,  _ Baron. _ Lying was certainly out of the question. Well— almost certainly out of the question. 

“Uh, what about Tracker, she hasn’t gone yet.” He hoped he could steer the conversation away from him and they would get distracted enough that he just wouldn’t have to answer. 

“It’s Kristen, dude. Obviously.” She looked at him with an expression he couldn’t read. God, he hated this so much. 

Even with friends that he loved and loved him back— a relatively recent development in his life— a voice in the back of his head told him that no one would be  _ in love _ with him, though. No one had ever felt that way about him and his worst fear is that no one ever would. So it was better to shove down any  _ feelings _ he had for anyone so he wouldn't be disappointed when they weren't reciprocated. And it was all too embarrassing and too heavy and too hard to share with the group. 

So even though he knew the real answer was Fabian, tonight not was the night he was capable of admitting that out loud. If he wanted to tell Fabian he liked him or simply would want to kiss him— and there was a part of him, buried deep in the weird feelings compartment, that really, really wanted to— he couldn’t. He just wasn’t ready to be honest and he didn’t know if he’d ever be ready to be honest and he hated that. 

“I, um—” 

“You okay, Riz?” Tracker said. 

He laughed, but even he could hear how strained it was. “Yeah, I’m fine. It’s cool.” 

“You don’t have to answer if you don’t want to,” Adaine said. Riz was so grateful to have Adaine here but even not answering was embarrassing in itself. He was trapped.

He could feel everyone looking at him. He couldn’t bring himself to look over at Fabian. 

“I, uh, yeah. I don’t really want to kiss anyone.” He shrugged and made a mental note to put this on the lie list he had going for everyone, but at least this lie wouldn’t create a person. Probably. “It’s— there just hasn’t been anyone that, uh, seemed right.” 

Fig looked like she wanted to say something, but Riz could see Adaine put a hand on her leg and shake her head. More love for Adaine welled up. 

He could feel the tension in the air. Now things had actually gotten weird. This sucked so fucking much. 

“Uh, what’s the plan for when we get to Leviathan?” Riz could feel the tension break as Fabian started to talk about his father and the pirates he knew. 

He tuned Fabian out as he started to compartmentalize his feelings again, trying to feel normal and not so embarrassed he wanted to run to the top of the van and jump into the ocean. Adaine shot him a look, asking if he was okay. He nodded back. He really was fine. It’s fine. He didn’t  _ need _ to tell anyone his personal business and he’s sure the moment felt much longer than it actually was. 

His feelings for Fabian would fade eventually, he would see him with Aelwyn and know that Fabian couldn’t possibly be interested in him and just be... content without anyone. Happy to have friends. It was okay. As long as he didn’t have to talk about it. 

______________________________________________________________________

Adaine and Riz were sitting in her tower, looking into some monster Professor Aguefort said was starting to terrorize the town. He was pinning a picture of an Afanc, a crocodile demon, to KVX bank, which seemed to be involved in literally everything that went wrong in town, when Adaine stopped reading and said, “Hey, Riz?” 

He was pulled out of his focus and looked up. “Yeah?” 

“I, um, I talked to Fabian today. About Aelwyn. And how even though she’s doing better now and I don’t actively want to kill her anymore, I’m still not comfortable with her being in the group.  _ You _ know, she helped my parents make my life miserable and even though I understand she was miserable in her own way, I haven’t totally forgiven her. Yet.” She looked sad, patting Boggy on his head. 

Breaking Aelwyn out of jail and working with her to beat the Nightmare King had been really hard for Adaine, and now that they were back in Elmville (with an A on their project!) Aelwyn was adjusting to living in Solace without the pressure from her parents. And currently leaving Fabian hanging on whether or not she wanted to date. (“That’s okay, you just left prison, I can wait!” Fabian had said.) 

“Oh. I’m proud of you. How’d it go?” 

The lines on her forehead smoothed out and she smiled. “He took it really well, actually. He’s been talking to Jawbone, too. Apparently, he wasn’t too sure about dating her, anyway. She reminded him a lot of his dad and he’s trying to be healthier than Mr. Seacaster was. ‘There’s always other people out there for me,’ he said.”

Riz shoved the ping of something— sadness, hope?-- into his weird feelings compartment. 

“So he’s free for anyone to ask out if they wanted to.” She looked at him intently. Riz felt embarrassment creep up his neck. 

“Uh, that’s great. I’m happy for both of you.” Riz smiled at her. 

She smiled back. “Riz.” She touched his arm gently. “I know you’re not gonna say this yourself, so I’m gonna tell you something, okay?” He nodded. “It’s okay for you to have a crush on Fabian.” 

“What? I, uh— I don’t—” he stopped avoiding her gaze and took a deep breath. He took a few moments to gather every shred of embarrassment and shove it down. 

“Okay, I like Fabian. It’s that obvious?” 

She laughed and patted his arm. “Yeah, dude. I think everyone but Fabian knows. It’s good!” 

He laughed, still blushing. “Oh, god. Okay. He’s so fucking dumb sometimes isn’t he?” 

“We’re all pretty dumb sometimes.” She nudged his arm. 

“Yeah, you’re right.” He felt lighter, not so crushed by embarrassment like he was a minute ago. 

“Adaine?” 

“Yeah?” 

“I don’t think I can tell Fabian right now. I just— I have some other things to work out first, I think.” He rubbed his hand on the back of his neck. Man, he should have been talking to Jawbone a long time ago. 

“That’s okay, Riz. Take your time.” 

Now that he could talk, he wanted to talk about everything. “I thought, you know, like love and all that wasn’t gonna happen for me and it made me embarrassed of every feeling I had about anyone. But that’s not— that’s not good for me.” 

“Oh no! That’s not good and that’s  _ not _ true. You're a catch, Riz.” 

He laughed. “Thanks, Adaine. I needed to be forced out of my own head. I’ll start talking to Jawbone, okay?” 

"That's great!" She waved him over to her bed and gave him a hug. “Fabian is gonna flip his shit when he finds out, though.” 

He pulled back and looked at her, brows furrowed. “What?” 

But she just smiled a shit-eating grin and shrugged. 


End file.
